Fooled by Data

This excellent post on Euri.ca has a very simple and clear illustration of how easy it is to jump to the wrong conclusions about data.

• If good looks and smarts are distributed normally, and
• If good looks and smarts have nothing to do with each other, and
• If movie producers want both smarts and looks
• Then, by observing employed actors we’ll assume that looks and smarts have a negative correlation
• Even though we constructed this experiment with no correlation

Even more interesting though, is that if we try to rule out bias by looking at aspiring but unsuccessful actors as well, we’ll find that they exhibit a similar correlation.

via BoingBoing.

Related: Business, Datavis.